Death of a Member: Baroness Thatcher

Lord Gilbert Excerpts

Wednesday 10th April 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gilbert]

My Lords, I would like to begin, if it is not an impertinence to speak from this side of the House on this subject, by associating myself as vigorously as I can with the remarks of the leader of my party in this House, my noble friend Lady Royall, and my noble friend Lady Dean in condemning some of the things that are happening in other parts of the country today. I was brought up, like many of your Lordships, under the rubric and golden rule “De mortuis nil nisi bonum”. I dissociate myself from what is going on. It has no part of my party’s support.

Secondly, I want to say how deeply I feel for noble Lords opposite who served closely with Mrs Thatcher in her Cabinet and at No. 10. I know what it is to lose a friend and a leader, even when they have left the leadership. I remember very vividly how desperate I felt when Harold Wilson died. I understand that colleagues opposite must feel terrible emotions at this time and I want them to know that they are understood on this side of House.

I am now, not unnaturally, going to talk about something a little unfashionable about the late Baroness—her luck. She was a very lucky Prime Minister and a very lucky politician. There is nothing wrong with that. I am sure that I will be corrected by the historians among us, but I am told that whenever a name was put to Napoleon Bonaparte for promotion to general, his first question was, “Is he lucky?”. It is a very good question indeed. Baroness Thatcher was very lucky. To say that is in no way to diminish her achievements and accomplishments. I want everyone in the House to understand that.

But look what happened at the beginning. It was only because not a single man was prepared to stand against Mr Heath, whether on the grounds of reticence, gentlemanliness, loyalty or timidity, that she was the only one. That was luck. She could not have arranged that in advance, so what brilliant luck. I remember when it happened. I was in the same committee as the noble Lord, Lord MacGregor, when the news came through. I remember rejoicing with my noble friend Lord Barnett, who was leading for the Government. He was Chief Secretary and I was Financial Secretary to the Treasury on that occasion. We rejoiced and said, “That’s marvellous. The Tories will never win a seat north of Watford from now on”. It just shows how wrong and stupid one can be.

Then we get to the 1979 election. Who could have lost the 1979 election against a Government where the dead were going unburied, the garbage was piling up in the street and the country was in a state of utter shambles? She could not have lost. Anybody leading the Tory party would have won the 1979 general election. We created Margaret Thatcher, in that sense.

As for the next two general elections of 1983 and 1987, I have to be rather careful. I know that it is said that you make your own luck in this world. I do not know whether Margaret Thatcher had a big part in the choice by the Labour Party as to who was to lead them into the 1983 and 1987 general elections, but she could hardly have done a better job, in my view. If I say any more, I will probably get the Whip removed from me, so I must be very careful.

She really did not have it that difficult in those two general elections. As for some of the other people whom she was up against—Arthur Scargill; I ask you. Would you not love to have Arthur Scargill as your opponent in any debate going, a man who is frightened to go to his own members to get them to vote for a strike that he called? I cannot find parliamentary language to use to describe Arthur Scargill. Mrs Thatcher did not create Arthur Scargill; the National Union of Mineworkers, or certain branches of it, did, although not in my part of the world, I am glad to say, not in the West or East Midlands.

After Arthur Scargill, she was up against a bunch of fascists from a tinpot banana republic in South America. It was a gift. I am told that it was a very close run thing: that we might not have won in the Falklands. I do not share that view, although I know that that is an unorthodox view. I know that certain things happened down there that should not have happened and that there was a certain amount of military bungling, which was our fault—not Mrs Thatcher’s fault. As far as world opinion was concerned, to be up against a bunch of tinpot fascists was absolutely brilliant. She was lucky. She did not decide that the Argentines were going to invade the Falklands. She did not decide what a bunch of so-and-so’s they were to have running their country. That was all her good luck. Good luck to her, but do not let us forget that she had an enormous amount of luck right through her career from beginning to end.

I assure noble Lords that that is in no way intended to diminish her achievements, because the important thing in this world is that if you get your luck, you use it and take advantage of it, and she did, ferociously, without any quarter given. I admire her greatly for that.

I have said enough this evening. I feel honoured to have served in both Houses when Margaret Thatcher was a Member.

I have just remembered a little story. I will let your Lordships into a secret that no one in this Chamber will know until I describe it, not even the noble Lord, Lord Wakeham. I was once present at a conversation between Mrs Thatcher and Ted Heath. I was the only other person present: beat that. She had only recently become leader of the Conservative Party. It was an extraordinary event that brought that to pass.

I had gone to a memorial service for Hubert Humphrey. It was held on a day when the Cabinet was meeting. The Cabinet was going to come, but had not showed up because the meeting had overrun. The first three rows on the left-hand side of the aisle were left empty, and I parked myself in the middle of the fourth row. I had not been sitting there long before a figure came up and sat down next to me on my left. It was Margaret Thatcher. She was looking sparkling and effervescent. Needless to say—do I regret it? No, I do not—I tried flirting with her. I thought I was doing rather well, actually. Of course, I would, would I not? I complimented her on how her dress suited her, the colour of her eyes and all that sort of thing. We were getting on famously.

The rest of the pew was empty until, all of a sudden, a shadow appeared at the other end of the pew, escorted by the ushers, and was sat down next to me on the other side. It was Ted Heath. There then ensued a conversation between Margaret Thatcher, me and Ted Heath, which was a very unusual conversation in that nobody said a thing to anybody from start to finish. Considering the personalities involved, I think that is probably unique. That is enough of that story.

We have lived in the shadow of greatness. We shall never see her like again.